The Gran Poder and the Reconquest of La Paz...importance,the river that ﬂowed through the valley was named Choqueyapu,“ﬁeld of gold,”and was well-known for the many treasures

The Gran Poder and the Reconquest of La PazBy

David M. Gusstufts universit y

r e s u m e nEn este artículo se analizan las enormes transformaciones en el uso del espacio público

occuridas en La Paz, Bolivia, en los últimos años y los variados significados atribuídos a

las mismas En primer lugar, una revisión de la historia colonial de la ciudad revela una

geografía de tipo racial impuesta por los españoles, afectando sobre todo a la comu-

nidad aymara de Chuquiago. Seguidamente, se analiza el impacto de la masiva

migración indígena desde el campo a la capital a principios del siglo XX, tomando como

foco la festividad del Gran Poder y su ambivalente relación a las fuerzas dominantes de

la sociedad boliviana de la época. Esta fiesta se convirtió en vehículo poderoso de mov-

ilización de la nueva población urbana; en complejo aparato discursivo que reflejaba las

identidades raciales y étnicas en formación. En consecuencia, el Gran Poder no fue sim-

plemente un barómetro de cambio de la sociedad boliviana, sino también un evento

constitutivo de la misma. Finalmente, este artículo demuestra que la “indianización” de

La Paz que ha acompañado la aceptación gradual de la susdicha fiesta ha crecido para-

lelamente al indigenismo resurgente, el cual ha culiminado en la elección de Evo

Morales a la presidencia del país en el 2005.

PALABRAS CLAVES: performance, fiestas, Gran Poder, política de etnicidad, Aymara,

La Paz, Bolivia. KEYWORDS: performance, festivals, Gran Poder, cultural politics,

Aymara, La Paz, Bolivia.

Landscape and Race

It’s hard to forget the first time you arrive in La Paz. Few cities are so dramatic andalmost none so unusual. It’s not a classic beauty, a city huddled around an island-filled bay like Rio or San Francisco or even an assemblage of architectural gemsframed by a magnificent river such as the Seine or Hudson. La Paz sits more like a

294 Jour nal of Latin Amer ican Anthrop olo g y

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The Gran Poder and the Reconquest of La Paz 295

lunar crater, nearly treeless and completely exposed at more than 12 thousand feet.But one doesn’t climb to this city set high in the Andes. One descends from thebarren plains of the altiplano.

The road that spins down into the bowl over 1,200 feet below emerges fromanother satellite city that has been built above it. El Alto, or “The Heights,” nowalmost equal in population, didn’t even exist 50 years ago. Yet today, its sprawlingunpaved streets lined with open markets and half-finished, hollow-brick homeshave engulfed La Paz’s John F. Kennedy International Airport. In fact, it is the fastestgrowing city in Latin America. But the unemployed miners and campesinos whohave been drawn there by the hope of work do not present the picturesque imageone has of an ancient Andean community. If one arrives in La Paz by plane, it islikely you won’t even see El Alto. The daily flight from Miami lands just before dawnbefore its inhabitants have begun to stir. Only as one passes over the Ceja, the“eyebrow” that forms the border between El Alto and the other, more prosperouscity below, does the first light start to pick up the ring of snow-capped peaks thatsurround it—Mururata, Chacaltaya, Huayna Potosí, and most dramatic of all,Illimani. It is this 21 thousand foot mountain, visible from any vantage point, thathas become the city’s most important landmark.

When the Spaniards founded the city in 1548, they came from the same direction,across the altiplano and down the steep slopes into the basin below. Pizarro andCarvajal’s insurrection had just ended and the Crown wanted a safe place for soldiersand traders to rest as they traveled between Cuzco and Lima in the west and the min-ing centers of Sucre and Potosí to the east. Led by Alonzo de Mendoza, Nuestra Señorade La Paz was founded twice; the first time in the altiplano church of Laja and thenthree days later in its present, more hospitable location. Of course, Mendoza and hissmall group were not the first Spaniards to visit the area. Drawn by rumors of gold,the Pizarros and others had come to see what from pre-Inca times had been one ofthe most important centers of the Aymara world. Its name, Chuquiago, meant “prin-cipal”or “head staff,” indicating its political and spiritual centrality.As to its economicimportance, the river that flowed through the valley was named Choqueyapu,“field ofgold,” and was well-known for the many treasures it had yielded.1

The Spaniards were not the first strangers to arrive. A number of groups hadfought over the city, most notably the Incas who under Maita Capac tried to sub-due it around 1185. Armed resistance combined with diplomacy enabled Chuquiagoto remain independent (Valdez 1948:36–39). Various groups did settle in the area,however, and by the time of Alonzo de Mendoza’s arrival the population was a mix-ture of Pacajis, Lupacas, Collas, and other Aymara-speaking groups. There is norecord of how large the native population was at this time but 38 years later whenthe first census was taken there were a total of 5,820 Indians and 260 Europeans(Guía de La Paz 1948:12).2 Already the indigenous population was being

transformed into a single entity, similar to what occurred to Native Americans inthe rest of colonial America. Even more significant was the way the new city wasbeing constructed. Immediately, two plazas were established—a Spanish one on thesite where Alonzo de Mendoza took possession, and an Indian one several blocksaway on what would eventually become Avenida América.

From the start, the city was divided in two, with strict limitations on which partsthe indigenous population could enter. This continued well into the 20th centurywith legal restrictions preventing native peoples from setting foot in the PlazaMurillo, the city’s administrative and cultural center.3 The Choqueyapu River servedas an unofficial border. As with all colonial cities, the closer one lived to the mainplaza, the higher one’s status and greater one’s income. Native groups were kept atthe margins where for many years they maintained their traditional agriculturalcommunities. But as La Paz grew and the demand for additional land increased,these communities too were absorbed one by one. This process, which accelerateddramatically in the 19th century, is well documented by the Bolivian historianRossana Barragán (1990).According to her, the disappearance of La Paz’s native pop-ulation was not the result of intermarriage and attrition, but of the loss of collectiveland ownership and of the social systems that allowed people to identify as Indians.The fact that La Paz’s native population declined from 81 percent in 1650 to 30 percentin 1909 does not reflect a racial shift as much as it does a cultural one (Barragán1990:233). The mestizos who replaced them were racially indistinguishable, yet cul-turally they no longer identified as Indians. Instead of subsistence farmers with thecollective support of the ayllu, they were now wage-earning artisans. They mightalso be bilingual, wearing clothes and celebrating holidays they formerly disdained.For Barragán, this mesticizing process was a cultural phenomena driven by the starkeconomic realities of colonialism; uprooted and detached from the land, indigenouspeoples entered a new cultural orbit that transformed their identity.

Barragán, like many Andean scholars, has focused on the difficulty of establish-ing racial categories in a society so clearly obsessed with them. In fact, earlyobservers were quick to perceive the arbitrary nature of most Andean classifications.In 1945, Julian Steward wrote of the Peruvian Andes, “When Indians have adoptedthe Spanish language, European clothing, and other national traits, so that they areno longer conspicuously different from other people, they are classified as mestizo,though racially they may be pure Indian” (1945:283). And three years later, OlenLeonard observed:

With such class, rather than caste, distinctions, it is obviously an easy matter for an

“Indian” to become a mestizo or for a mestizo to cross over into the white class.

Examples of the former are witnessed in La Paz every day. The Indian moves in from

the country with his distinguishing dress of home-spun, knitted cap and sandals for



the men; shawls, multi-colored and pleated skirts, derby hat and bare feet for the

women; secures employment, develops fluency in Spanish and is henceforth classi-

fied generally as cholo or mestizo (1948:450).

The fluid nature of such identities, which scholars have continued to appreciate for thelast 50 years, has resulted in a great deal of anxiety for those moving between thesedifferent realities. What many claim anchors, or in turn dislodges these identities isthe relationship one has to the land. Barragán wrote about this in terms of the actualsocial and economic structures created in the communities of the original inhabi-tants of La Paz. Others refer to it in more symbolic terms. Orlove, for example,writes of a “narrativization of the earth” whereby rural indicators of earthiness—sandals, adobe, clay pots, fertility rituals—become emblems of virtue in one con-text but stigmas in another. Once in the city, the proximity to the earth is not onlyleft behind but strongly discouraged. What was spiritual and positive is now back-ward and unhygienic. In leaving the countryside for the city, Indians also trade oneidentity for another, a mestizo one, which according to Orlove (1998), is associatedwith both the nation and progress. Weismantel identifies this process as the “geog-raphy of race,” an Andean phenomena in which identities are continually shiftingdepending not only on one’s location but on the person one is addressing. Race is arelational category, both binary and unstable, with the greatest opposition betweenthat of country and city (Weismantel 2001).

Given this scenario, one might ask whether Indians can even exist in the city,or if in order to flourish in a dignified manner, they have to reinvent themselves asmestizos. And until now, this has certainly been the case. In addition to the publicspaces from which they were excluded, were the many institutions, such as schoolsand government, that barred people in traditional dress. This has been particularlydiscriminatory for indigenous women whose large pollera skirts, long braids, andbowler hats marked them as Indian. But men too, as a result of their names orfaulty Spanish, faced similar exclusion. In order to gain access many changed theirclothes, took new names, and improved their Spanish. In other words, they becamemestizos. But even that did not dissolve the barrier that exists between the twohalves of the city. In fact, as many have noted, La Paz remains the only capital inLatin America with two names, its official Spanish one and that of Chuquiago, theoriginal indigenous one, which has never been forgotten (Pacheco 1997:229). Thereare indications, however, that after nearly five centuries, this may be changing andthe city is slowly being remapped. Some believe it is the fulfillment of the revolu-tion started by Tupac Katari in 1781 when he blockaded the city for seven monthsand nearly expelled the Spanish. As he was brutally executed he promised:“I willreturn and I will be millions.” Today the city is under siege once again, from bothwithin and without.

La Paz 1900 and Julio Cordero

Once established, La Paz quickly became Bolivia’s most populous city. Yet itremained little more than an agricultural center for the first 350 years of its exis-tence. In 1900 it had fewer than 50 thousand people.4 However, the country wasstarting to change and La Paz was to assume an important new role. The emergenceof tin on the world market revived Bolivia’s depressed mining industry with La Pazpositioning itself as the new financial center. This was soon followed by a dramaticrise in manufacturing, particularly textiles, which in turn attracted a new wave ofimmigrants from the countryside. La Paz also became the country’s official capital,until then located in Sucre. Construction boomed and within 30 years the popula-tion tripled. It was becoming an Indian city once again with most of its new inhab-itants monolingual Aymara from the altiplano. They settled in an area called Chijinion the steep western slopes overlooking the valley. Its name meant “grassy” or“pasture,” a reminder of its recent use as a hacienda.

A new geography of race, made possible by innovations in transportation such asstreetcars and automobiles, soon developed. Proximity to the main plaza became lessimportant as the upper classes migrated to the lower parts of the city—the Prado,Sopocachi, San Jorge, and eventually the Zona Sur. The indigenous population, on theother hand, lived in the higher elevations where services and amenities were notice-ably fewer. It was also much colder with the steep, treeless slopes more susceptible tolandslides during the winter rains. Status and ethnicity now corresponded to the alti-tude one lived at—lower, paradoxically, being higher.5 But the frontier between thesecommunities remained the same, the Choqueyapu River, and, when that was hiddenin tubes below ground, the main street that passed above it. Laws also continued torestrict movement, creating what Xavier Albó has referred to as a “dual state system,”a Bolivian version of separate but equal where access to many parts of this nominallydemocratic society were limited to the Euro-Bolivian minority (1997:129).

The enormous changes that occurred in La Paz during the first two decades ofthe 20th century were not unlike those in other major Latin American centers. Citieslike Rio de Janeiro, Lima, and Havana were also transformed by the influx of hugenumbers of poor migrants from the countryside. Even the United States saw simi-lar changes as blacks fled the South in record numbers, transforming such cities asChicago, Detroit, and New York. Most analyses of these radical shifts in populationfocus on the tremendous social upheaval they engendered—the appalling livingconditions, health and sanitary problems, epidemics of crime and violence, theexploitation of workers, and the intense discrimination coupled with the repressionthat met any attempts at redress. While these accounts may be true, they ignore thecultural explosion that routinely occurred when groups met at what Lipsitz aptlycalls “the dangerous crossroads,” that place where inter-cultural dialogue between



immigrant and host is charged with the legacies of colonialism and oppression(1994:121). Inevitably, it is a place of struggle from which dynamic, often disturbing,new forms emerge.

La Paz became as rich an incubator of these new cultural forms as any city inLatin America. At the same time, the struggle for legitimacy and acceptance has beenequally if not more arduous. In fact, many of these forms are still stigmatized aspagan legacies, emblematic of the primitive Indian past hindering Bolivia’s success-ful modernization. Only over the last several years, as Bolivia reels from the political,economic, and social chaos brought about by neo-liberal restructuring has a newinter-cultural dialogue been initiated, and with it, a reevaluation of the many expres-sive forms which for decades have been resisted. Whether this will change the actualface of the city is still a question; but the realization that there are different notionsof public space has certainly been acknowledged. As Armando Urioste, La Paz’srecent director of culture wrote:“Cities are not simply the physical imposition ofbuildings and streets. They are above all spaces of symbolic interchange whereby cul-tures that share these environments manifest their right to the use of its public space”(Araoz et al. 2004:1). This declaration is an important concession on the part of offi-cials who have long wished to impose a single definition of order and discipline.

When the first wave of Aymara immigrants began arriving in La Paz in the early20th century, they found a city in which the use of public space for celebration orany other demonstration was strictly reserved for Euro-Bolivian men. And not sim-ply native peoples, but women and children too were denied the same access tostreets and plazas. Similar to the Victorian culture just losing its grip in the UnitedStates, Great Britain, and many other parts of the world, a strict division existedbetween domestic and public space: women and children belonged in the formerwhile men had the privilege of occupying the latter. People of color, indigenous orotherwise, existed at the edges as servants or laborers. This world, where the elitesheld center stage, imprinting their domination on public space, would undergo atremendous challenge with the arrival of La Paz’s new inhabitants. By the 1920s, asChijini grew and the upper classes migrated southward, the culture of the city beganto change. Fortunately, this process was documented in great detail by JulioCordero, Bolivia’s most famous photographer.

Cordero, whose turn-of-the century cityscapes and portraits now adorn restau-rants, hotels, and offices throughout the city, was a pioneer of the new medium inLatin America. Born in 1879 in the small Aymara village of Pucarani, not far fromLake Titicaca, Cordero moved to La Paz at an early age, apprenticing with the Peru-vian brothers, Julio and José Valdez. By the age of 21 he had opened his own studioon Calle Comercio. Like his more famous Peruvian contemporaries, MartínChambi and Max Vargas, he earned his living doing studio portraits. But he was alsoan official government photographer and as La Paz expanded so did his business.

He traveled everywhere shooting the radical changes taking place—the construc-tion of new buildings and factories, the arrival of streetcars and planes, the comingsand goings of presidents and officials. He also focused on celebrations and publicceremonies—weddings, funerals, inaugurations, parties, even executions, and ofcourse, festivals, which in the first 20 years of the 20th century did not mean Indiansin picturesque costumes. His numerous images of comparsas and fraternities, eitherposed or riding through the streets, offer a rare glimpse of a world on the verge ofdisappearance. Of course, the same elite continued to dominate but the culture of


Figure 1 Self-portrait of Julio Cordero, 1900.

Photo by Julio Cordero

http://www.anthrosource.net/action/showImage?doi=10.1525/jlat.2006.11.2.294&iName=master.img-000.jpg&w=255&h=379


the upper and middle classes would soon be different. Polleras and bowler hats wouldnow be worn only by “Indians,” and mass public celebrations would be consideredundignified, even savage. For the moment, however, these Euro-Bolivian groups stillannounced that the streets were theirs and that blacks and Indians were unwelcome.

Cordero’s photographs show a festive world dominated by white and criollomen, professionals and business leaders joined together in small fraternal orders.They traveled through the streets in horse-drawn carriages or even cars. Theirnames—Terrorists,Anarchists, Bohemians, Casino Strikers—were all subversive yetthey were not.

The members of the Black Hand are typical, all dressed as European dandieswith tuxedos, cummerbunds, skimmers, and white bucks. They were also wearingblack gloves to mark their membership in a secret order. The Terrorists of 1913appear even more elite in their double-breasted white suits.Were they going to a car-nival or to the British Open? What is it that they wished to display? One is remindedof New Orleans and such Mardi Gras krewes as Rex and Comus which were formedin direct opposition to the inclusionist politics of Reconstruction.As Mitchell pointsout, these krewes were composed of a white elite anxious to reestablish their

Figure 2 The Black Hand.




Figure 3 The Terroristas, 1913.


Figure 4 The Terroristas traveling down Calle Evaristo Valle, Carnival, 1913.

Photo by Julio Codero




dominance and with it their “grandiose claims of ruling the city” (1995:62–63). Thecelebration they promoted was a double inversion, as chaos and disorder werereplaced with a rigid and exclusive hierarchy. According to Mitchell,“they also helpedchange Carnival from something in which people participated on an individual basisinto something in which audience and actors were clearly delineated” (1995:60).Images too of Mardi Gras krewes and early 20th century Paceña comparsas are strik-ingly similar. They move through the streets elevated above the masses like royalty,tossing small gifts to the Indians who can only stand and watch, while from the bal-conies women throw streamers, welcoming them as conquering heroes.

The comparsas could also be brutally satirical, as in the 1912 photograph of agroup calling itself the Durmientes. Like other groups of this period, they were com-posed of Euro-Bolivians. However, they were dressed as Indians, or at least they sig-nal Indianness through the wearing of chullo hats, shirts, and bags. One holds a signreading “donkeys for sale,” while young pongos or native servants are forced to holdup their banner:“Durmientes,” sleepers, lazy ones, Indians. It is an offensive andhumorless stereotype, far outlasting groups such as these who used Carnival andother festivals to articulate such views. In fact, they would soon to be replaced by thevery indigenous peoples they were mocking, and within a short time become tar-gets themselves of new satirical forms.

Figure 5 The Durmientes, 1912.

Photo by Julio Codero


All of this was captured by Julio Cordero who meticulously photographed thecity’s transition from a 19th century backwater of white privilege and dominationto a bustling urban center filled with immigrant voices straining to be heard. Itwould be a long time, however, before these groups gained access to the streets con-trolled by the Anarchists, Terrorists, and Black Hand. But Cordero photographedthese new actors as they prepared to enter from the wings. With names like Fugi-tives of Love, New Harbor of Pleasure, and Always Alert, they presented a strongcontrast to the white male fraternities that preceded them. Cordero’s portrait of theFugitives of Love, for example, shows a wonderfully mixed group, with men, womenand children joined together. They look as if they’ve been partying for a long time.Empty bottles of Pilsner along with their instruments are on the grass in front ofthem. Most of the women are dressed in the pollera style that would soon becomecommon among all urban Indians. In the middle are a group of men with simplemasks and large buttoned coats similar to those worn by pepinos. Reclining in frontare two men in elaborately embroidered costumes. They are Ch’utas and this is oneof the first photographs anyone has ever taken of them.

Derived from Chukuta, or native of Chuquiago, Ch’uta was claimed to refer toany indigenous person born in La Paz. The Ch’uta dance, on the other hand, has a


Figure 6 The Fugitivos del Amor.




close association with the most oppressed of all figures, the pongo who was theindentured native child forced to sleep beside his master’s front door in order to lethim in.6 The Ch’utas’ elegantly worked costumes are based on the much simpleroutfits worn by the pongos, a kind of Cinderella fantasy completed by a mesh maskwith rouged cheeks, blue eyes, and moustache. This mask, which can be seen rest-ing on the hat immediately in front of the Fugitives of Love, was used to parody thepretensions of the whites. It was a classic performance of Andean ambivalence, adance of both repulsion and desire, of status elevation and identity assertion. Or asManuel Vargas noted:“Without denying his Indianness, and at the same time ridi-culing the whites, the Ch’uta assumes through his costume a level of economic well-being in a society whose ruling class is not exactly Indian” (1993:48). Today, it is the

Figure 7 This early studio photo of a Ch’uta standing beside a Pepino reveals his relation to the humble

figure of the pongo. The mask in his right hand, however, could easily be the face of his former master.



Ch’uta who dominates Carnival, dancing in large groups through the same streetswhere the Terroristas of 1913 once rode.

The Ch’utas weren’t the only new form developing at this time. In fact, theimportance of the La Paz Carnival was beginning to wane, overshadowed by a muchnewer celebration called the Fiesta del Gran Poder, the Festival of the Great Power.A moveable feast taking place eight weeks after Easter on Trinity Sunday (late Mayto early June), the Gran Poder, which began as a small neighborhood event, wouldeventually grow into the largest urban Indian celebration in the Americas. WhileGran Poder cults date back to Europe in the 15th century (Albó and Prieswerk 1986:9),the one occurring in La Paz was only initiated in the early 1920s. Only then did thenewly arrived residents of the Chijini section start banding together to honoranother recent arrival to the community, a miraculous 17th century painting of theFather, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Señor Jesús del Gran Poder

The painting that arrived in the expanding Chijini neighborhood some timearound 1915 had been on a long journey of its own. Created by an anonymous colo-nial artist, the three and a half by six foot canvas was part of a long and controversialtradition of images of the Holy Trinity. Many suggest that such paintings originallyderive from Celto-Roman pagan forms or the Vultus Trifons images of Cerberus,Janus, and Geryon. By the early Middle Ages, such trifacial paintings had becomecommon though the Church was increasingly uncomfortable with what it consid-ered primitive monstrosities. In the mid-16th century the Council of Trent outlawedthem entirely, and then in 1628 reiterated the ban with an even stronger prohibition(Pettazzoni 1946:151). In place of representing the Holy Trinity with a single bodyand three heads, artists now developed new variations. The Father was depicted asan old man with a globe on his lap, the Son as Jesus holding a cross or chalice, andthe Holy Spirit as a dove. This was the form of Titian’s Trinity, painted for CharlesV in the early 1550s. However, the safest and preferred variation became one inwhich all three figures were represented as separate but identical images of Jesus,often as part of much larger allegories.7

In Colonial Latin America all of these versions flourished, although the one thatfirst appeared in La Paz in the early 19th century was considered the most offen-sive—a single body with the three faces of Jesus perfectly joined together by foureyes. Between the figure’s outstretched arms was an equilateral triangle that reachedto its feet. At the corners of the triangle were circles containing the Latin words for“Father,”“Son,” and “Holy Spirit.”A fourth circle, located in the center, was attachedto all the others by separate lines. Inside it was the word “God.”Along the inner lineswas written the word “is” while in the triangle’s outer lines running between



“Father,”“Son,”and “Holy Spirit,”were the words “is not.”This diagram was an illus-tration of the Holy Trinity dogma.

The painting, which became known as Señor Jesús del Gran Poder, “Lord Jesusof the Great Power,” entered the Concebidas Convent in the possession of a youngnovitiate named Genoveva Carrión.8 In addition to bringing objects, the nuns werealso permitted to bring two orphans who after being adopted worked as servants.They eventually became nuns themselves and inherited the property of their adop-tive parent. This is how the image of the Gran Poder was handed down from oneCarrión to another until the convent was forced to relocate from the center of thecity. This occurred around 1904 when the Church officially labeled the paintingimagen contra rito, prohibiting it from being included in any Catholic ceremony.Irene Carrión and María Concepción, heirs of the painting’s original owner,decided to leave the convent, taking the image with them. It now began a long pere-grination journeying from house to house. Many devotees can still name all the

Figure 8 Image of the Gran Poder, Museo de Arte, Lima, Peru.


stops it made like Stations of the Cross—Miraflores, the home of the Mirandabrothers on Calle Juan de la Riva, a year at number 45 Calle Mercado, and otherstops on Calles México, Yungas, and Figueroa. And with each stop, it came closerand closer to Chijini. Vilela del Villar’s description of this journey is filled with reli-gious passion and foreboding until, like a huge epiphany, it is offered a permanenthome in the community which would eventually adopt it:

And then one day as the anguished devotees headed up one of those steep streets,

with no idea where to turn to find shelter for their Image, they met by chance a good-

hearted neighbor named Mostacedo, who was astonished to hear of their terrible sit-

uation. And immediately he offered his house on Calle León de la Barra. Afterwards,

he rejoiced and was inwardly pleased because Divine Providence had shown him

such special favor. According to his own account, “that lucky day, I went out to the

street for no reason beyond a strange impulse, as if some unknown force was driving

me from inside.” (1948:373)

Followers soon began visiting the image on Fridays, burning candles and leavingflowers. They also prayed and asked for various favors which when granted,increased the belief that the image had miraculous powers. In either 1922 or 1923, noone is quite sure, a small celebration honoring the image occurred on the day of theSantísima Trinidad, and the fiesta was born.9

Chijini, still beyond the official city limits, was growing rapidly. In 1926, the orig-inal Jawira hacienda was subdivided and sold. For the Aymara Indians flooding intothis area, the Señor del Gran Poder was the perfect patron saint. He too was a newresident, displaced and marginalized just as they were. Eventually, their identitieswould become so intertwined that the neighborhood itself would become knownas the Zona del Gran Poder. Their relationship would also be the source of one ofthe greatest creative explosions the Andes has known.

As more and more adherents came to worship, an agreement was reached tobuild a special chapel in order to house the painting. Land was found on CalleGallardo and in 1928, construction on the Capilla del Gran Poder begun. But theChurch hierarchy was not happy. An image which had been labeled heretical andunworthy of any sacraments was being adopted by a large and extremely passion-ate group of followers. The Church also questioned the manner in which the imagewas being worshiped. Was it too close to various pre-Colombian deities who werealso portrayed in the form of a trinity (Gisbert 1994:88–90)? And were these Indi-ans capable of distinguishing between the two? Or were they perverting the HolyTrinity with their own, deeply-rooted superstitions? It was widely held thatsupplicants asking for a favor for a loved one prayed to the face on the right. Onthe other hand, if they wished to have someone harmed, they prayed to the face onthe left. For requests for oneself, the middle face was addressed. Finally, in 1930,



unable to stand it any longer, the Bishop of La Paz, Augusto Schieffert, ordered thatthe image be repainted. The fact that it belonged to the Carrión family and theneighborhood that had adopted it didn’t seem to matter. It was impossible, how-ever, to find a local painter who would agree to do it. In the end, two foreigners,thought to be Peruvians, were located. Stories abound about the terrible conse-quences that befell them. Some say they fell off their ladders and went crazy.According to Vilela del Villar:

It was retouched by two inexperienced foreign painters who had lived a somewhat

loose life. At one point these painters arrived drunk to finish the last details on the

Image’s face. As one of them moved his brush over the eyes, the extraordinary fig-

ure, according to witnesses, moved his head and narrowed his eyes in a sign of

reproach. The terrified painters fled and were never seen again. (1948:372)

The painting was now left with only one face, and the triangle and circles on itschest covered up. But the popularity of the image was not diminished and, to theChurch’s dismay, it began to be considered even more powerful. In fact, manyclaimed that the faces still manifested themselves despite being hidden. At the sametime, a new parish was established in order to meet the area’s growing needs. Placedunder the authority of a group of Dutch Augustines, their first act was to build achurch on Max Paredes, a street several blocks below the one where the Gran Poderwas housed. In 1942, a year after the area was officially incorporated into the city,rumors began to circulate that the image was to be relocated to Bajo Chijini, the siteof the new church. The neighborhood quickly divided with the upper and lowerparts fighting pitched battles in the streets. When the moment came to actuallyrelocate the image, a group from the Junta de Vecinos, or “Neighborhood Associa-tion,” snuck into the chapel in the middle of the night and stole it. They eventuallylocated one of the Carrión heirs and purchased it from her for one thousand Boli-vianos. Several months later, confident in their ownership, they returned the imageto its home on Calle Gallardo, announcing plans to renovate and expand the chapel.

The Bishop was enraged and immediately prohibited any religious ceremoniesfrom taking place in the chapel. It would be a full five years before a truce wasbrokered, the terms of which included relinquishing control of the image to theChurch while at the same time guaranteeing that it would not be moved from CalleGallardo. Despite this agreement, the renovation of the capilla was a masterpiece ofsyncretism. The stained glass windows were filled with references to pre-Incaic cer-emonial sites. Even more impressive was the new altar. The painting was flanked oneither side by enormous wooden monolitos identical to those found in Tiahuanaco,the national symbol of Bolivia’s illustrious pre-Columbian past. Together, the threefigures formed a new trinity. The Gran Poder had not only been adopted, it had alsobeen mesticized, just like those who had taken it in.

In the meantime, the fiesta had also gained momentum. It was now largeenough to warrant a detail of 200 police officers although the largest activity wasstill not the organized procession of dance fraternities known as the entrada. Itbegan instead with a soccer tournament and ended in the evening with fireworks.In between, different dance troupes would pass through the streets at random, eachparading in front of the chapel to pay homage to the Señor del Gran Poder. These


Figure 9 Señor Jesús del Gran Poder, La Paz, Bolivia. In the lower left is Saint Augustine and in the lower

right Saint Thomas Aquinas. They are both holding pens, a reference to their scholarship on the Holy Trinity.

One can still see part of the image that was painted over just behind the figure’s hands.



early groups were relatively small, composed of the humblest members of thecommunity. The Cebollitas or “Little Onions,” for example, credited with being oneof the first groups, was made up of newspaper sellers. They wore ponchos anddanced with pan-flutes known as zampoñas not unlike a procession in a smallindigenous village. The Choclos or “Ears of Corn” were another early group whoperformed a dance known as the Suri Sikuri. This dramatic dance, which someclaim pre-dates the Christian era, originated from an ostrich-hunting ritual. Todaydancers still balance enormous feathered crowns up to six feet in diameter while

Figure 10 Church of the Gran Poder, Calle Gallardo, La Paz, Bolivia.

Photo by David M Guss


beating drums and playing sikuri pan-flutes (Urquizo Sossa 1977:111). Another pre-Columbian dance transported from the countryside was the Kullaguada, said to beinspired by weavers from the altiplano. In this somewhat coquettish dance, deco-rative spindles are carried by masked couples dressed in colorful costumes withembroidered hearts sewn onto them.

One dance not imported from the countryside by the new residents of Chijiniwas the Diablada, the Devil Dance. This form was a direct byproduct of colonial-ism and the brutal conditions under which Indians had been forced to work. Orig-inating in the mining center of Oruro at the end of the 18th century, the Diabladawas an allegory in which the forces of good and evil struggled for supremacy.While the Archangel Michael, representing both Christianity and European civi-lization, appears to triumph, the devils too achieve their own liberation emergingfrom the underworld of mines to which the conquerors condemned them. It wasthe perfect pageant for an indigenous community that had itself been demonizedand was now trying to establish itself in a new environment. La Paz’s first Diabladawas founded in 1927 and remains the oldest continuous fraternity in the GranPoder. Unlike the other troupes that had already formed such as the Choclos andCebollitas, the Diablada’s membership was not composed of porters, shoeblacks,and newspaper sellers. Their founders were costume and mask makers, hence theirname, Unión de Bordadores del Gran Poder de La Paz, the Union of CostumeMakers of the Gran Poder of La Paz. These were the artisans responsible for thefantastic creations that would soon become the signature of the festival itself—the grotesque masks with terrifying teeth and huge horns covered with serpents


Figure 11 An early Diablada group photographed by a contemporary of Julio Cordero named Jiménez.



and lizards and bulging eyes made from thermoses, the shimmering capes stud-ded with colored stones and sequins, the breastplates with their golden dragons,and the heavy aprons with hundreds of antique coins sewn on. Here was a glimpseof what the festival would eventually become and the cyclone of creativity thatwould drive it. At the moment, however, it was still a dispersed and somewhat dis-organized celebration. It would be several decades before it moved beyond theborders of Chijini to challenge the status quo of La Paz. For now, it remained aneighborhood event, an instrument through which the identity of a new commu-nity was established.

The Associación de Conjuntos Folklóricos del Gran Poderand the Birth of the Morenada

For most of the 1940s and 1950s, the Fiesta del Gran Poder remained relativelyunchanged. The number of dancers and devotees increased, yet it remained an infor-mal neighborhood event with sports competitions, fireworks, and a handful of fra-ternities dancing past the church at different hours. By 1960, the population of La Pazstarted to spike dramatically. Bolivia’s revolution had occurred eight years earlierbringing an MNR-led civilian government to power.10 There was extensive educa-tion and land reform. Universal suffrage was also granted and the largest tin minesnationalized. In an attempt to eliminate discrimination, the term indio (Indian) waslegally replaced by that of campesino (peasant). These changes were accompanied bylarge shifts in population. In the next 25 years the number of people in La Paz woulddouble. Even more dramatic was the growth of El Alto, the satellite communitylocated on the altiplano above it. With only 11 thousand people at the time of the rev-olution, El Alto grew nearly ten-fold by 1976 and then ten years later, after more thandoubling, became an independent city (Arbona and Kohl 2004). Most of these immi-grants, the vast majority of whom were indigenous, found their way to the neigh-borhood of Chijini, and when residing there became too expensive and congested,to El Alto. They also found their way into the dance troupes of the Gran Poder.

Joining a dance fraternity upon arriving in a disorienting new environment hadmany advantages. It was a way to integrate oneself into a ready-made community,with rehearsals, parties, and dances providing an important bonding experience.Many of the fraternities were also organized around prior affiliations such as tradeassociations, villages of origin, or even neighborhoods within the larger Chijinicommunity. The choice of group would also become an increasingly strategic deci-sion as it offered new members a chance to network with more established figuresin different occupations. Of course, religious devotion was a key incentive, espe-cially for poor immigrants desperately in need of help. For them, the image of theGran Poder was a magnet, a magical figure whose countless miracles were legendary

throughout La Paz. When one needed help, the Gran Poder was often the first placeto turn. Prayers and appeals always ended with a promise, a solemn vow that thesupplicant would fulfill some task in honor of the sacred image. More often thannot, the promise was to dance on the day of the Santísima Trinidad. And so theFiesta del Gran Poder continued to grow.

By 1969 there were 15 dance fraternities with enough participants to require amore organized entrada, the official entrance of the groups on the Saturday justbefore the Santísima Trinidad. A predetermined route was now established with aset order based on the seniority of each group. A program was also published and aset of rules issued determining how the dances would be judged and the prizesawarded. All of this was the responsibility of the Junta de Vecinos, the same neigh-borhood association that had rescued the image when it was threatened with theftin 1943. This was also the group that had spearheaded the construction of theCapilla del Gran Poder on Calle Gallardo. They remained devoted to the church andto the important relation between the Gran Poder and the relatively new commu-nity of Chijini. But in 1974, after decades of controlling the event, the Junta deVecinos was suddenly displaced by a newly formed organization with a radically dif-ferent vision of what the Fiesta del Gran Poder should be.

1974 was an important year for not only the Gran Poder, but for Bolivia in gen-eral. While Hugo Banzer had controlled the country for the past three years, it wasonly then that he consolidated his power, outlawing political parties and unions,closing universities, and eventually forcing thousands of people into exile. In a clas-sic populist gesture, he also chose it as the year to participate in the Gran Poder, thefirst time a president of the Republic had ever done so. He sat in the review stand(palco) on Calle Buenos Aires, Chijini’s principal avenue, watching as the diablos,morenos, suri sikuris, llamaradas, kullaguadas and other dancers wound their waythrough the neighborhood’s hilly streets. It was a tremendous validation not onlyfor the Fiesta del Gran Poder but for the newly formed association that had takenover the organizing responsibilities for the entire event.

The Associación de Conjuntos Folklóricos del Gran Poder (ACFGP) had been offi-cially established on May 12th only weeks before the 1974 entrada. Its founders,Lucio Chuquimia, Luis Calderón, and Carlos Suárez, conceived of it as a congresswhere each of the fraternities—27 when it began—would have two elected repre-sentatives who would meet regularly to debate questions related to the festival.There would also be a separately elected directorship with a president, vice-president,treasurer, and various other figures who would carry out the work of the executivebody. For the Association’s first 12 years, Lucio Chuquimia served as president withthe headquarters located in his home directly above one of his numerous busi-nesses.11 Chuquimia, whose father had helped found the Gran Poder’s firstDiablada, controlled every aspect of the Association. While many criticized his



autocratic style, he insisted that he had been democratically reelected every twoyears. But criticizing Chuquimia was dangerous as his brother-in-law and Associa-tion cofounder, Luis Calderón, discovered. A radio announcer and folklorist,Calderón found himself ostracized when he challenged Chuquimia’s leadership.One anonymous source described his style as typical of Latin American dictators:

What’s happened is very similar to Stroessner in Paraguay, where there are certain

fanatical supporters who have created relations of spiritual kinship with him. And

the same thing happens with the elections: the president of the electoral committee

is his compadre . . . Completely fanatical people who identify the Gran Poder with

Lucio Chuquimia. (Albó and Preiswerk 1986:116)

More than Stroessner, it was Bolivia’s own dictator, General Banzer, whoChuquimia admired most. And it was to him that he turned to fulfill his vision of agreater Gran Poder, one that would extend beyond the borders of Chijini, becom-ing a nationwide symbol. As Chuquimia explained to me in a 1999 interview,Banzer hadn’t simply appeared at the Gran Poder, he was personally invited byChuquimia who went to great efforts to meet him:

In 1974, when I was already president, we thought: How do we make this really fan-

tastic, great, because I already had the idea of elevating folklore, not just doing the

same thing the [Junta de] Vecinos had been doing. So the first idea was the President,

to invite him, to get his support. And so I went to work right away, but, señor, how

do you meet the President? I didn’t know anybody who knew him, not even a neigh-

bor who did. It was so hard to do, it really made me weep. But you know how it is

when you have faith. I ran into him on the Batallón Colorados. The amount of

guards the President has! I spoke to him though, and he promised me right there,

the President, that he would come to the Buenos Aires. And the situation then was

very serious politically. And then it snowed, so should we dance or shouldn’t we?

Should we even hold our festival? But through the Palace we heard that the President

was coming, so right away I ordered all the groups to get ready and that’s when we

did it. And then the entire press started writing about it: “The President is at such

and such a place. He’s been at the entrada folkórica.” (Personal Communication)

With Banzer’s participation, the festival immediately achieved a new nationalprominence and the following year, the general led the dancers all the way down thePrado, La Paz’s most elegant commercial avenue. It was the first time they hadcrossed the Plaza San Francisco and the invisible border that had divided the twohalves of the city since the time of the Conquest. According to Chuquimia, this hadalways been his goal. He had wanted Bolivia’s folklore to be recognized as a vital,national form in the country where it was practiced, fully aware that its acceptancewould pave the way for a new appreciation of the marginalized actors who per-

formed it. He explained this in the same 1999 interview:

It was really a tremendous feat, that I had gotten La Paz’s, or should I say, the Gran

Poder’s folklore recognized. And after that, I found it a lot easier, because of course,

we want to please all the people of La Paz, because this is a free spectacle that we put on.

We charge absolutely nothing for the seats, and the government understood this and

gave us permission to come all the way down [into the center of the city], which was

prohibited at that time. It was prohibited to just play a flute (zampoña), because our

music was an embarrassment, because one couldn’t even dance a cueca in refined

circles.12 I had become so, so bitter. I had traveled. I was in Mexico. I was in Spain. I

was in Argentina. And how they loved our dances. “Wow, your folklore, your cul-

ture!” And it made me weep to tell them what was happening, that in our country

what mattered was the tango, the waltz. But we had our own beautiful forms. That’s

why I went to all the authorities and said to them: “Come on, let’s go, don’t be

ashamed of who we are. Pick up a flute. Let’s export our own folklore treasures that

we’ve hidden away.” And they understood. And that’s how we began to spread the

Gran Poder.

If the President has, with his presence, accepted our folklore, then it’s like I’m

telling you, it’s time for all Bolivians to do the same, to cherish their folklore. And

now the young people have adopted it and that was for me the most, the most beau-

tiful thing, together with the University that started its own entrada. Now, now then,

now there’s no shame, now there’s no more of this imported stuff. So then now

there’s no twist any more, now all that is off a little to one side now, all of that. So

why wouldn’t I be happy that we’ve gotten the young people interested, and even the

small children who I see dancing in the schools. Thank you, Señor del Gran Poder!

For we have entered into the heart of every Bolivian, and now we can say that as

Bolivians we love our richness which is our folklore!” (Personal communication)

New organization and leadership weren’t the only things to change in the Gran Poder.A new dance had begun to dominate the event, transforming it as dramatically as thenew Association and direction of its powerful president had. The Morenada, as thedance was known, had existed in various forms for a number of years but its adapta-tion to the Gran Poder was unique, and it allowed the festival to reposition itself injust the way that Chuquimia had envisioned. These fraternities would expand toincorporate hundreds of dancers, each with two brass bands of 60 musicians apiece.They would also appeal to the new urban Indian now inhabiting Chijini, a more pros-perous and independent entrepreneur with middle-class aspirations. With its costlymembership and lavish costumes, the Morenada quickly became a way to displayone’s new economic status. No dance would equal its prestige, and while participantsstill insisted that religious devotion was their principal motivation, the reality was



often different.“The popular bourgeoisie,”as La Razón labeled the morenos,“showedthemselves off in the festival” (La Razón 2005:11). And as the same article went on tosay, they reflected a growing diversity within the community:

The popular class with the most economic power distinguishes itself from those with

less resources through the opulence of their costumes and activities. In the Gran

Poder, economic and social differences run deep. Some fraternities are elitist, reflect-

ing a new bourgeoisie, while other groups, in particular the older ones, try to survive

amidst the excess of wealth. (La Razón 2005:11)

Figure 12 Moreno from the Morenada Comercial Eloy Salmón, 2000.



Unwilling to be confined to the neighborhood of Chijini, the morenos would be atthe forefront of the new Gran Poder, challenging a Bolivian oligarchy that hadmarginalized the indigenous population, whether urban or not, for generations. Forthem the dance would be a vehicle through which the city would be remapped, eras-ing old boundaries and with them the stigmas that had been long associated withnative cultures. Through the ostentatious display of their new economic power thedancers would inevitably receive the respect and acceptance that had always eludedthem. Or at least that was the hope, as using dance to negotiate new social realitiescan be fraught with ambiguity and conflict. As Goldstein (1998a, 1998b), Mendoza(2000), and Salomon (1981), among others, demonstrate, dance has been a frequentdevice through which Andean groups have made the difficult transition from coun-try to city. And yet, whether in Peru, Bolivia, or Ecuador, these dances reflect thecontradiction and tragedy of “group[s] poised in the space between two cultures”—neither rural nor urban, traditional nor modern, Indian nor mestizo (Salomon1981:164).

The Morenada, for all its assertiveness, captured this collision of identities per-fectly and along with it, the longing to transcend them. In this sense, the dance hasbeen as much about ethnic mobility as about social mobility, reconfirming theracial geography that has continued to define one’s identity in the Andes. To live inthe city, surrounded by all the material symbols it connotes, is to be mestizo if notnominally “white.”Yet the same person, living in the country, speaking Aymara andworking in the fields, would be unquestionably Indian. The Morenada became thedance of choice for those engaged in this psychologically traumatic transition. It islittle surprise, therefore, that its images and symbols are bound up in a painful playof shifting identities, reflecting the same “racial estrangement” that Weismantel hascharacterized as the chronic Andean condition (2001).

The Morenada, which may be defined as the “dance of the blacks,” is of disputedorigins. Some claim it arose from African slaves parodying their masters whileworking in the silver mines of Potosí, while others say that it is based on the move-ment and songs of Africans in the lowland vineyards where they were put to workproducing wine. Still others support the increasingly popular belief that it hadnothing to do with African slaves at all but originated among Aymara groups livingon the Altiplano near Lake Titicaca. From there it traveled with the coca merchantswho brought it along with their wares to the miners of Oruro where it appeared asearly as 1913 (Abercrombie 1992:302).13

In its early stages the dance appears to have been performed without masksalthough the dancers did wear wigs based on the style of the colonial courts. Themasks that were adopted were grotesque caricatures of African slaves suffering fromthe harsh Andean conditions, their eyes bulging and their lips and tonguesextended. They also wore miner’s hats with colorful feathers and fruits on top. These



were worn by the morenos or “blacks” who formed the core of these large troupes.But there were other figures as well such as the achachis, the “old men” with whitemasks who carried braided whips and were said to represent the overseers. Whetherthis choreography tells a story of rebellious subversion or painful submission is alsodisputed. And yet, one wonders why the Indians are playing blacks in this drama,since it was their own ancestors who were forced to work in the mines during thecolonial mita. Such racial displacement is at the heart of the Morenada where nativecampesinos on the way to becoming middle class mestizos dress up as African slaveswho in turn are parodying their white masters.

Figure 13 Achachi.



The costumes meanwhile continued to grow with huge barrel-like skirts,embroidered vests, and enormous high-collared shoulder-pieces, all reachingup to a hundred pounds. When women were finally included in 1982, the groupsincreased even further in size forcing the Association to limit the number of fra-ternities allowed to dance the Morenada lest the festival be completely takenover by it. It was even awarded a special category in the annual competition andcommonly referred to as the pulmones del Gran Poder, “the lungs of the GranPoder.”14 The largest Morenadas, such as the Fanáticos del Folklore en GranPoder, would eventually reach a thousand members and the effect of seeingthem dance down the streets of La Paz four abreast with matracas clacking wasthat of an approaching army. At least that was the impression it seemed to haveon the city fathers, who after Banzer’s departure in 1978 became much less wel-coming of the event.

Chuquimia’s vision of a festival that was not only embraced by the city but actu-ally defined it would not be realized for nearly 30 years. For most of the interimbetween it served as a symbol of excess and waste, of backwardness and superstition.Cosa de indios, or “just another Indian thing,” was how one dancer claimed the Euro-Bolivian community thought of the event. And indeed, for nearly three decades itseemed to embody every negative stereotype associated with indigenous people. Thechurch complained that it was not a serious religious celebration but merely anexcuse for lewd and drunken behavior. And the business community protested thatit shut the city down for days on end, causing thousands of man-hours to be lost. Thegovernment, meanwhile, did all it could to prevent the festival from arriving at thecity’s center. Every year, it seemed, there was a confrontation between the Associationand the mayor’s office over the exact details of the route. And when the Prado wasredesigned, the government, fearing the dancers and crowds would destroy thebenches and landscaping, rerouted the event away from the main street altogether.But there were other problems as well. In 1998, an earthquake in the Department ofCochabamba hundreds of miles away was used as a pretext to postpone the event fora full month. And in 2001 when Víctor Paz Estenssoro died two days before theentrada, the mayor summarily announced that the festival would have to be canceledout of respect for the former MNR leader. Risking tear gas and the national guard,the festival proceeded as planned with the Association insisting that the streetsbelonged to the people and that the date of a religious celebration was not negotiable.

The dancers, meanwhile, had no illusions about the origins of this hostility. Itwas simply part of the country’s long history of racism which viewed indigenousculture as a major impediment to progress and development. It was only logical,therefore, that the city’s elites would resist what they perceived as an invasion of thevery forces they had condemned since the time of the Conquest. Why else had theCarnival in Oruro, only several hours away, received continued praise and support



while the Gran Poder was relentlessly pilloried in the press? The Oruro event hadeven been nominated for a UNESCO Cultural Patrimony of Humanity award andyet the Gran Poder was dismissed as a disorganized rabble and nuisance.15 The dif-ference, according to many, was that the Oruro Carnival had become a safe, middleclass, mestizo event while the La Paz celebration was still an indigenous festivalthreatening the very identity of the city. Alejandro Chipana, a prominent memberof the Association, put it simply in 1999:

We’re the number one enemies of everyone, attacked by every side, from everybody.

We’re a perfect target for the whole world. There’s no one who doesn’t attack us.

(Personal communication)

And yet, changes over the last several years in Bolivia have led to a startling reposi-tioning of the Gran Poder. In October 2003, the city had been blockaded by anenraged coalition demanding that the country’s natural gas reserves be re-nationalized. Following a number of deaths, the protesters succeeded in oustingAmerican-backed president Gonzalo Sánchez de Losada who fled to Miami. Theleaders of this insurgency were a former guerrilla named El Mallku (Felipe Quispe),who was attempting to reestablish an Inca-style Aymara state, and Evo Morales, thepopular champion of a union of coca growers opposed to the plant eradication poli-cies of the U.S. government. The convergence of these two movements had rein-forced the enmity between native populations and those Euro-Bolivians still seen asnot simply conquerors but as emissaries of the United States. The government thatemerged vowed to reevaluate the country’s neo-liberal policies as well as to enactnew forms of power sharing. To do so, they pledged to hold a referendum on theexploitation of natural gas as well as convene a constitutional convention.

Given the perennial antagonism between the government and the Gran Poderand the fact that the Aymara dancers were the same people who had protested onlymonths earlier, I expected the 2004 entrada to be particularly explosive. And yetwhat I found surprised me. The festival had become an important instrument ofreconciliation in a country traumatized by unprecedented violence. Suddenly, thegovernment was ready to take advantage of the event. President Mesa himselfdanced, becoming the first to do so since the 1970s when Hugo Banzer participated.The Gran Poder was now portrayed as an important natural resource, a unique cul-tural form which symbolically mirrored the other valuable riches the electorate wasanxious to defend. Not only did the government, press, and church treat the cele-bration differently, but the festival organizers were also quick to perceive this seachange. For the first time they began characterizing the festival as a “response toglobalization,” and an important part of the national heritage.

Throughout 2005, the crisis in Bolivia continued to worsen. By the end of May,when the festival was scheduled to take place, La Paz was a city under siege, overrun

by protesters clogging the streets with daily demonstrations. Many doubted whetherthere would even be a Gran Poder and yet a three-day truce was suddenly declaredin order to allow the event to take place. Commentators hailed the festival as a forcefor hope and dialogue. Some said the celebration should be held 365 days a year as itwas the only peace the country had seen in nearly a year (Paulovich 2005). Onceagain an event that had been excoriated as divisive and disorganized was now beingextolled as representing the very best of Bolivia. Was this evidence that festivals,whose typically ludic and transgressive response to a normative status quo, wouldreverse themselves, becoming exemplars of order once the state dissolved into chaos?Or was it recognition that the Fiesta del Gran Poder had indeed reconquered La Paz,transforming it into an indigenous city once again? Six months later, Evo Moraleswas elected the nation’s first indigenous president. At his inauguration, he comparedBolivia to South Africa at the end of apartheid, recalling a time when “Indians werebarred from entering the plaza” (Smith 2006:A8). He then invoked Tupac Katari’sprophecy:“I will return and I will be millions.” The Gran Poder had arrived.


Figure 14 Cartoon from La Razón, May 23, 2005. It compares the Gran Poder to the blockades and other

chaos the county was experiencing, questioning the difference between the two. Which was worse: the Gran

Poder or the demonstrators? In the back seat, a passenger is about to commit suicide.

Artwork by Trond Scheen



Acknowledgments

My thanks to Javier Sanjines who first suggested I visit the Gran Poder and to LisaMarkowitz who made that 1994 visit possible. My research for this project has beensupported by generous grants from the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropo-logical Research, the Marion and Jasper Whiting Foundation, and the Tufts FacultyResearch Fund. I am especially grateful to Julio Cordero for sharing his grandfa-ther’s photographs with me and to Peter Yenne for his superb scans of them.Wolfgang Schuler also contributed with his wonderful photographs documentingthe history of our Diablada. While in Bolivia, I received support from a number ofpeople, but none more so than Godofredo Sandoval and the members of PIEB, thePrograma para la Investigación Estratégica en Bolivia. I am also grateful to the Asso-ciación de Conjuntos Folklóricos del Gran Poder whose members opened their doorsto me year after year, and to the presidents who led the Association during my vis-its there—Víctor Hugo Rodríguez, Federico Centellas, Nicolás Huallpara, andMarcelo Pabón. But it was in the averno of the Diablada Internacional JuventudRelámpago del Gran Poder that I really found a second home. To all the diabólicos,my many thanks, and in particular to Lucho Pérez, who has continued to hold thisfraternity together. But of all the devils, none deserves more thanks than KateWheeler, un Relámpago de corazón.

Notes

1Chuquiago is derived from the word chuqui, the plant which staffs or sceptres are made from, and

ago or agu, a variant of apu, “the supreme” or “main one,” as in a God. There are several variants of the

spelling including Chuquiagu, Chuquiabo, Chukiyawu, and Chukiwayu. It is sometimes written as well

with the suffix marka, which means town or place. The Choqueyapu River’s name is derived from choque,

“gold,” and yapu, a “planted field” (Valdez 1948:39).2Barragán notes that even before the Conquest, the area around La Paz was the most densely pop-

ulated region of Alto Peru, the name given to Bolivia during the colonial era. In 1573, only 25 years after

the foundation of the city, the district population of La Paz was put at 194,717 (1990:23–24).3Albó confirms that in 1925, the 100 year anniversary of Bolivia’s independence, a law was still in

place prohibiting any native person from entering the Plaza Murillo (1997:129).4Reports vary on La Paz’s population at this time, in part due to the dramatic decline occurring after

the War of the Pacific (1879–1884). Schoop claims that La Paz’s 1877 population may have been as high as

69,180. By 1900, however, its population may have shrunk as low as 31,600, although Klein places it as

high as 52,600 (Barragán 1990:74, Gisbert 1998:136, Klein 2003:270).5An interesting parallel to this geography of race was recently made clear through the dispropor-

tionate damage wreaked upon the Black community of New Orleans by hurricane Katrina in 2005. As

predicted by John McPhee in his 1987 article, “The Control of Nature: Alchafalaya:”

New Orleans, surrounded by levees, is emplaced between Lake Pontchartrain and the Missis-

sippi like a broad shallow bowl. Nowhere is New Orleans higher than the river’s natural bank.

Underprivileged people live in the lower elevations, and always have. The rich—by the river—

occupy the highest ground. In New Orleans, income and elevation can be correlated on a liter-

ally sliding scale: the Garden District on the highest level, Stanley Kowalski in the swamp. The

Garden District and its environs are locally known as uptown. (2005:38)

6The term pongo derives from puncu, the Aymara word for “door,” a reference to the signal task asso-

ciated with this legendary Andean figure.7The most famous painting of the Holy Trinity may be that of Titian who painted it for Emperor

Charles V in the early 1550s. In his version, the Father and Son are seated figures with the Holy Spirit a

dove rising above them. They are atop a cloud emanating rays over a huge allegorical scene below.

Included in this scene are Emperor Charles and his wife, Isabella, King Philip II, Mary of Hungary, Noah

holding an ark, Moses, David, Ezekiel, Adam and Eve, the Spanish ambassador to the Venetian court

(who asked to be included), and of course, the artist. For a comprehensive survey of this form, see

Germán de Pamplona, Iconografía de la Santísima Trinidad en el Arte Medieval Español (1970).8The Concebidas Convent, or Purísima Concepción as it was officially known when founded in 1663,

was located on Calle Sanjines not far from the main plaza. It was eventually moved to the Miraflores sec-

tion east of the city center. For the most thorough account of the images’s early history including its jour-

ney to its current home in Chijini, see Vilela del Villar 1948.9Santísima Trinidad or Trinity Sunday takes place the week after Pentecost or eight Sundays after

Easter and celebrates, as its name suggests, the Holy Trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Celebrated as early as the 10th century, it was recognized as an official church holiday by Pope John XXII

in 1334.10The MNR, which stands for Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario (Nationalist Revolutionary

Movement) was founded in 1941 with support from various groups including the miners and

campesinos. Ten years later, when the military denied Víctor Paz Estenssoro, the party’s co-founder, the

presidency to which he was elected, the MNR led a successful rebellion. They came to power with a long

list of promises including education and land reform, universal suffrage, and nationalization of the

mines. The party’s two leaders, Víctor Paz Estenssoro and Hernán Siles Zuazo dominated Bolivian pol-

itics until 1989 when Paz Estenssoro finished his final term as president. Ironically, it was during this final

term that Paz Estenssoro overturned the party’s key policy of nationalization of natural resources. It was

the privatization of natural gas, engineered by his chief economic advisor, Gonzalo Sánchez de Losada,

that would eventually lead to the party’s downfall. When Sánchez de Losada, by then president, used the

military to end demonstrations demanding the re-nationalization of natural gas in October 2003, the

resulting furor forced him to resign and flee the country. Not only did this end Sánchez de Losada’s term

in office but it effectively ended more than fifty years of MNR dominance in Bolivian politics.11Lucio Chuquimia Aguirre (1932–2003), whose name means “keeper” or “guardian of gold,” is the

perfect example of the new, upwardly mobile, middle class resident of Chijini. He studied both law and

engineering at La Paz’s principal university, the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, and spent time after-

ward working in the United States. But he chose to return to his childhood neighborhood where he

developed a number of business interests in hotels, real estate, and clothing. His specialty was school uni-

forms, which he sold in his Lluvia de Oro (Rain of Gold) store. Despite his considerable wealth, he

remained in Chijini, becoming active in the Gran Poder in which his parents had been leaders since its

start. In addition to his 12 years as president of the Associación de Conjuntos Folklóricos del Gran Poder,

Chuquimia also founded a kullaguada dance fraternity called the “X”del Gran Poder. This fraternity sub-

sequently split when a faction of its members decided to form a Morenada with the same name.12The cueca is a popular form with variations found in a number of South American countries

including Argentina, Peru, and Bolivia. It is especially popular in Chile where it is considered the national

dance. Energetically performed by couples either clapping or waving kerchiefs, the cueca is an extremely



suggestive and coquettish dance. Chuquimia’s reference to the dance is clearly ironic since it is an estab-

lished mestizo, rather than indigenous, form, and yet was still dismissed by Bolivian society.13There are various sources for this contradictory information on the origins of the Morenada

including Abercrombie 1992, Albó and Preiswerk 1986, 1991, Alvarado Reyes 1999, 2000, Boero Rojo 1991,

1977, Burgoa Andulce 1993, Fortún 1992, and Nash 1993. However, almost none of this literature deals with

the symbolism involved in the dance itself. A more elaborate discussion of all of these issues including

the political, historical, and semiotic will be discussed in my forthcoming book on the Gran Poder.14The Associación de Conjuntos Folklóricos del Gran Poder, which sets all rules for the festival, rec-

ognized that it was difficult for the smaller fraternities to compete with the enormous resources mustered

by the Morenadas. It decided, therefore, to create three categories for the awards given at the end of each

festival: the bailes pesados, “big” or “heavy dances” which were composed by the Morenadas alone, the

bailes livianos, “light dances,” which had at least one brass orchestra and included a range of dances such

as the Diablada, Tobas, Kullaguada, Llamerada, Caporales, and Tinku, and finally the autóctonos or

“autochthonous groups” which did not hire an orchestra but played their own indigenous music

consisting of mainly flutes (zampoñas) and drums. Included in this category were the Wakas, Quena

Quenas, and Incas. In the 2004 entrada there were 15 Morenadas among the 57 dance fraternities and in

2005 there were 14 among a total of 52 fraternities. Each Morenada, however, is many times larger than

almost any other fraternity. The number of fraternities participating varies from year to year as some

decide not to dance or may even be expelled temporarily.15After an aggressive campaign by the Bolivian government, UNESCO awarded Oral and Intangi-

ble Patrimony of Humanity (Patrimonio Oral e Intangible de la Humanidad) status to the Carnival of

Oruro in May 2001. Like the Gran Poder, Oruro’s Carnival also has an entrada featuring many of the same

dances. Yet if the Gran Poder is dominated by the Morenada, Carnival is dominated by the Diablada, a

form said to derive from the mines in this area. For more on this event and its relation to the Gran Poder,

see Abercrombie 1992, Boero Rojo 1977, and Harris 2003.

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Documents

The Gran Poder and the Reconquest of La Paz...importance,the river that ﬂowed through the valley was named Choqueyapu,“ﬁeld of gold,”and was well-known for the many treasures